Taste of Ash and Blood
by A. Zap
Summary: Adora had imagined kissing Catra thousands of times, millions of times. So many different ways that they would finally express themselves the way she'd seen romantic partners do around Bright Moon. She hadn't imagined it would end up like this. Femslash February Day 8: First Kiss


Smoke hung in the air over the battlefield like a fog and Adora could taste the ash on her tongue.

This war never got any easier when it came to damage left behind. And Adora found herself feeling it even more now than usual.

It didn't matter that she could hear the cheers coming from the other princesses and their allies. It didn't matter to her even as she watched Bow and Glimmer embrace in joy. After all, they'd won the fight!

But at some point in the middle of everything, Adora had lost sight of Catra. One moment they had been fighting side by side, back to back just like they were always meant to. The next there had been a wave of lasers from the remnants of Entrapta's bots that had been left behind in the Fright Zone, and Catra was gone.

As Adora frantically scanned across the battlefield, she could just barely conceal her panic. After all, it wouldn't do to worry everyone when they'd just been victorious. But as each glance yielded no sight of that familiar messy hair, the ever-present head guard, or those mismatched eyes that Adora loved to stare into whenever she had the chance.

And she wasn't the only one who had noticed her absence as she registered that Scorpia and Entrapta also appeared to be searching for her as well.

A cold hand gripped Adora's heart as a thought occurred to her.

Catra… Catra couldn't be dead, could she?

She tried to shake off the idea. After all, Catra was _way_ too stubborn to die. They'd thought that she'd been dead before, but she always turned up eventually. Maybe a bit wounded, and a bit more scuffed up than Adora would've liked, but Catra always came back.

She had to.

But the longer she looked, the more the thought that Catra was dead sunk its claws into Adora. She could feel her breath catching, her pants beginning to edge into sobs, fear clinging to her every movement.

Adora choked as peering beneath another overturned tank gave no results.

_Oh stars, she's gone, isn't she?_

"Catra…"

There was a ringing thud.

Adora's head whipped in the direction of the sound. A seed of hope planted itself in her heart.

Another thud and Adora zeroed in on a cluster of robots, loose panels, and overturned tanks. A dent was being created in one of the panels as a series of thuds pushed it further from the center of the pile.

Adora scrambled over to it, hope taking root and sprouting; she didn't even notice that she was calling out Catra's name.

With a final thud, the panel popped out and crashed to the ground.

Hope blossomed into reality as Catra emerged from the hole left behind.

She was visibly roughed up as she clutched her side and wiped some stray blood that had trickled from her mouth. However, she was also obviously okay, as she was already complaining and glaring at the pile of rubbish she'd come from.

"Ugh, I am _not _doing that again. I think I'll just leave that kinda stuff to our tanks like Adora from now on…" Catra finally looked up and her ears and tail perked up as well as she started to grin at her rapidly approaching friend. "Hey, Adora - "

Adora couldn't hold back.

The moment she was within reach, Adora launched herself at Catra. Her palpable relief gave her the urge to grab Catra's face and bring her in for a kiss.

So she did.

Adora would admit that she had fantasized about kissing Catra before. Forbidden kisses within the shadows back when they were still enemies, romantic kisses by moonlight at a ball or festival, happy kisses when they woke up in the morning, sad kisses made to comfort each other, triumphant kisses where the Horde was finally defeated.

She had never thought that their first kiss would be in the ruins of a battlefield after Adora had thought that Catra was gone again. She had thought their first kiss would be sweet, not one made with the taste of ash and now Catra's blood in her mouth. She'd wanted it to be important and monumental...

However, she couldn't complain that they were finally kissing.

And even better, Catra was kissing her back.

That didn't mean that she could escape from the flat look Catra tossed her as they pulled away from each other.

"Really." She said. "You choose now, of all times, to kiss me."

"I thought you were dead!"

"Rrr! As if I would die so easily."

"I was just - so happy that you were actually alive." Adora looked away, the heat from her face alerting her to the fact that she was blushing. "I couldn't help myself."

She glanced back at Catra to see a matching blush rising in her own cheeks. Catra tried to play it off as she rolled her eyes. "Whatever." She pulled Adora back in. "Just kiss me again, you idiot."

And Adora happily complied as they shared their second, third, and fourth kisses.

* * *

_AN: I can't help but think that Adora and Catra's first kiss would be on the battlefield. Especially after a close call or when one of them is literally on the verge of dying. Because I'm pretty sure they are both disaster lesbian, even if they seem to have a handle on things half the time._

_Anyway, originally I was thinking about having Catra nearly die, but I figured making Adora think she might be dead was bad enough. Though if we're being honest, if Catra does eventually ally herself with the Rebellion, I'm pretty sure the Horde would make a big deal of her death (that of a traitor second-in-command) to deter any other traitors._

_Also, that "rrr" sound Catra makes when Adora says that she thought Catra died is meant to be like that sound that cats make sometimes where it's like they can't believe you just did something that offends them and their parents and ancestors. It's kind of a cute sound._


End file.
